


Hunting by Numbers

by ladygray99



Category: Numb3rs, Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Crossover, Gen, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Tumblr: jaegercon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-10
Updated: 2013-08-10
Packaged: 2017-12-22 23:45:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,165
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/919451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladygray99/pseuds/ladygray99
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Newt has some ideas but he needs a different kind of mathematician.  Hermann has arranged an introduction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hunting by Numbers

**Author's Note:**

> I can't help the head canon that says Hermann and Charlie would know or at least know of each other.

The girls tittering in the front row of the auditorium grated along Hermann's nerves until he could feel it in the back of his teeth. The pun wasn't even funny but when you're a celebrity professor, with the face of a man half your age, pretty math majors sit in the front row and laugh at your jokes. The fact that Dr. Eppes seemed nearly as bouncy as Newt as he preened for his class did not improve Hermann's initial impression of him.

He grit his teeth. Personalities and egos had stopped mattering as more and bigger monsters ripped up cities. Unless you were a Jaeger pilot, then it was all about the blasted ego. 

Hermann flipped through his own notes in the back of the auditorium while Eppes fielded far more questions than was strictly necessary. He glanced over to Newt who was thumbing through Eppes book, _Hunting by Numbers_. In some magazine interview he swore the title was the publishers idea. 

Hermann wasn't so sure. He'd watched, with the rest of the world, long before Kaiju dominated the news, the Ripper 2.0 trial. He'd watched as Dr. Eppes had charmed the jury and made the defense look foolish. As John Jones aka Ripper 2.0, had smiled at Dr. Eppes and said 'so you're the hunter'. It had gotten him the nickname long before the first Jaeger was built.

The last of the starry-eyed students drifted away. Newt bounced down to meet Doctor Eppes with Hermann in his usual place trailing behind but only by a step. Newt had gotten better about running too far ahead of him after they got separated in the middle of a Las Vegas casino during a convention and missed their presentations. At least with the LA heat he got up that morning with only half the usual ache in his leg. Dr. Eppes held out his hand to Hermann.

"Doctor Gottlieb, a pleasure to meet you. I've been following your work for a while."

Hermann blinked in slight surprise and managed to pull his face into a smile. "And you Doctor Eppes. May I present my colleague, Dr. Newton Geiszler."

Newt grabbed Dr. Eppes' hand. "It's Newt, please. And thank you so much for agreeing to see us Doctor Eppes. You are a hard man to get a meeting with, it took me forever to get Hermann here to use his secret mathematician handshake."

Hermann tried not to die of embarrassment as Dr. Eppes extracted his hand. "It's Charlie, please. Do you mind if we take this to my office, it's just around the corner?"

"No problem." 

Charlie slug his bag over his shoulder as he led the way. His steps were slow and paced and for once Hermann wasn't pushing himself to keep up. He wasn't sure if he should be grateful or angry that Dr. Eppes felt the need to do that. He felt better once they entered Dr. Eppes' office with its deep wood paneling and thick carpets, set off by dark green chalkboards and the smell of chalk.

"Newton, this here is what an office should be. You will note the complete lack of Kaiju intestine on the floor."

Newt just waved him away. 

"So how can I help you gentlemen?" Dr. Eppes asked while gestured them to the leather, overstuffed couches. 

"Well I have this theory behind the Kaiju. I think they are far more sentient than we give them credit for or at least there is some other mind behind their actions. I don't think their attacks are random. I mean they look random but I don't think they are. It think their attacks are coming in a particular order for some particular reason. And you… Well I read your book… I mean I tried to get my _colleague_ here to do the math but…"

"But I am trying to put my effort into closing the damn rift instead of trying to see one of those things up close like a lunatic." Hermann snapped.

"So I was thinking," Newt continued without so much as a pause. "I mean I asked around and when it comes to tracking anything violent and biological with half a brain your name keeps coming to the top and believe me I've see a Kaiju brain, or at least what was left of it. I mean those are big ass brains. You can't tell me there's not thinking going on so I was wondering if maybe you could help. They call you the hunter." Newt held out a thick folder and finally took a breath. 

Doctor Eppes just tipped his head and stared at Newt for a moment. Hermann wasn't sure if he should leap to Newt's defense or start apologizing for him.

"Leave it to me to finally get a cool nickname and it comes from a sociopath. But you know, I actually had a thought along those lines a few months ago."

"Really!" Newt sent Hermann an 'I told you so' look as Doctor Eppes took the folder and started thumbing through it.

"Yes, I thought I saw a bit of a pattern looking at a map but the Jaeger program mainly has me focusing on my cognitive emergence work in an attempt to optimize the Drift."

"You're working for the program?" Newt asked.

"Everyone is working for the program." Hermann found himself saying eerily in sync with Doctor Eppes.

"Okay that was creepy."

"I actually know Nova Starburst's pilots. They're old friends. Also their head technician." 

Doctor Eppes was already erasing large swaths of his boards. Hermann breathed the clean scent of chalk not mixed in with rotting Kaiju bits. 

"How many kills is Nova Starburst up to? Four, five? I'd love to meet the pilots."

Hermann sighed as he pushed himself up to watch the first row of equations go down. Every undersexed or oversexed male, and many of the females of the Jaeger project wanted to meet Nova Starburst's pilots. They were the first pair of female pilots and their Jaeger was the first with a sword attached. No one was sure who thought of it but it was generally believed that an idea like that could only have come out of Hollywood. 

"Sure." Doctor Eppes already looked distracted as he glanced between his work and the data Newt had brought.

There was a quick knock on the door. An older man popped his head in. "Charles?"

"Ah, Larry, come on in. Larry, Doctor Hermann Gottlieb. Doctor Gottlieb, Larry Fleinhardt."

Hermann nearly ran to shake the man's hand. He'd read several of Dr. Fleinhardt's papers when he was much younger and despite studying math it had turned his mind to the ideas of inter-dimensional travel. "It's a pleasure to meet you Doctor Fleinhardt, it truly is."

"You two should sit and talk while I get these first ideas down. Both of you are into multiple dimensional stuff. You could pick at each other's brains."

Hermann grinned. "I would absolutely love that."

**Author's Note:**

> So I have an idea that Nikki and Liz ended up piloting Nova Starburst, and Ray Ray is their head technician. Because you can't convince me Ray Ray wouldn't have killed to get his hands on a Jaeger.
> 
> I also have and idea that Don was injured in an attack and that's why Charlie is used to slowing down his pace a bit.
> 
> Feedback would be really nice on this one. 0.0


End file.
